The invention relates to a manipulator for applying a contact lens in or removing a contact lens from a user""s eye. This manipulator is of the type that includes a manipulation part for manipulating the manipulator with the fingers, a supporting part fitted on the manipulation part for supporting the contact lens in operation, and a concave face for receiving and detachably retaining the convex face of the contact lens.
For among other things cosmetic reasons, many prefer to use contact lenses instead of glasses. The user normally makes use of his fingers to apply or remove contact lenses at the risk of thereby bringing impurities and/or bacteria from the fingers onto the lens and/or into the eye.
With a view to remedy this disadvantage during application of a contact lens, an applicator described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,695,049 has been developed. This applicator has a concave, elastomeric disc for preliminarily holding the contact lens. With a finger under the disc, this elastomeric disc is then inverted so that it assumes a convex form with the contact lens placed on the now formed convex face of the disc. Finally, the contact lens is applied in the eye while the user""s finger is placed under the disc. Neither this finger nor any other of the user""s fingers will thereby come into contact with the contact lens or the eye, thus avoiding introducing contaminants into the eye.
During storing and distribution, the contact lens is lying together with sterile saline solution of suitable concentration in a bowl that the elastomeric disc forms in its original, concave form. The bowl is tightly sealed by e.g. a cap during storage.
The applicant has a previous International Patent Application, publication no. WO 99/21519, which is incorporated herein by reference thereto. This application discloses a package in form of a cup which is closely connected to a fingerstall for applying a contact lens into an eye. The package has a chamber with a sterile saline solution within which the contact lens lies. When the contact lens is to be used, the package is opened so that the contact lens is made to lie on a concave face on the fingerstall to which it adheres due to the surface tension in the saline solution. Then, the user uses the fingerstall to guide the contact lens into his eye where it will remain as the adhesive force between the eye and the contact lens is greater than the adhesive force between the lens and the concave face of the fingerstall.
The applicators disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,695,049 and PCT Patent Application publication no. WO 99/21519 are not useful for removing a contact lens from an eye. However, such a device is known from U.S. Pat. No. 4,512,602 which functions with a suction disc at the end of a handle for handling the device during the operation. When the contact lens is to be removed, the suction disc is made to stick to the contact lens. Then, the user pulls at the handle of the device in order to thereby loosen and remove the stuck contact lens from the eye.
As a contact lens is stuck to the eye with a quite considerable adhesive force, there is thus a risk that this device will not only pull the contact lens free of the eye but that the cornea will more or less follow. Thus, the present invention seeks to provide an improvement over these known devices.
From European Patent Application 0588434 is known a contact lens fitter-remover having a rigid structure with to tweezer legs. Removal of an inserted contact lens is done by resting the ends of the legs on the contact lens, closing the legs so that by means of the transversal pressure exerted by the fingers, the lens bends slightly and become detached from the eye.
This rigid tweezer construction is difficult to manoeuvre during application and removal of the contact lens and the rigid edges of the end of the legs of the tweezer are likely to damage the contact lens. Consequently, this fitter-remover is unsuitable for reuseable lenses.
The present invention now provides a device that overcomes the problems of the prior art.
The present invention provides a manipulator for applying a contact lens in or removing a contact lens from a user""s eye. This manipulator device is both easy and safe to use.
A plurality of such manipulators are conveniently provided in a single package. In addition, the invention provides a container for storing contact lenses.
The novel and unique features of the invention relate to the fact that the manipulator furthermore includes at least one slit made in the supporting part and extending from the concave face of this supporting part. When the manipulator is used to remove a contact lens from an eye, a part of the contact lens is preliminarily received as a fold in the slit whereby, between the eye and the contact lens, a channel is formed that ends in the open air. During the pulling off of the contact lens, this lens is gradually loosened from the eye while air is filled up under the loosened areas so that a negative pressure cannot be built here which in a harmful way could cause the cornea to completely or partly be loosened or pulled off the eyeball.